My DP doesn't look after his mind, body or soul.

[RedStripeLass]

I'm at a loss with how to help him. He's 35, we have a 3 year old daughter who was very much planned, both work in our careers of choice yet I'm worried we are crashing and burning.

Where do I start.... When we met 8 years ago he was fun, popular and a real laugh to be around. Now he's sullen, moody and tired all of the time. I mean all of the time. Any extra time in the day will be spent in bed. He never sees friends anymore. He doesn't appear to even have friends anymore.

He doesn't shave and doesn't even wash more than a couple of times a week. I'm making sure he wears clean clothes. He doesn't eat much or properly despite me cooking for him and is, I think, underweight.

He's suffered ill health and bereavement this year but will not face up to anything bad. I'd love him to access some counceling but he is entirely resistant to even the suggestion.

He drinks and smokes pot every single night till he's asleep. He works in the service industry and I know both are ingrained in this world but it's no longer social. I'll enjoy a drink with him a few nights a week but I'm not a smoker. He is sinking over £70 a week smoking pot on his own in the garden. How sad is that? We are so poor at the moment it breaks my heart.

I'm sure he's suffering from depression but he will not indulge in even the slightest bit of self reflection.

Where do I go from here? The whole sorry situation has now caused me to suffer with anxiety and I'm getting tired of propping our family unit up. I'd love to expand our little family but rationally thinking, everything tells me I can't bring another child into this till he's well. How on earth do you make someone access therapy?

Not directly no, but that is what he is saying if the substances he is using are essential to him.

Well, ask him not to drink and smoke for a week. If he's not an addict, it shouldn't be a problem, should it.

In any case, OP. This isn't really about your daughter's father. It's about your daughter. And about you. Are you willing to continue to subject your daughter (and yourself) to what this man is putting your through (and which will get worse)?

Yes, he says he absolutely must have cannabis or he can't sleep and is too hyper and can't switch off. He Drink wise I think he sees it as just a nice way to relax.

he says he absolutely must have cannabis or he can't sleep and is too hyper and can't switch off.

And that, right there, is addiction. You shouldn't need drugs to sleep.

He thinks he has ADHD. He was very hyper as a child and taken to doctors for it. He says without it he'd be like that again.

If you read my very very recent threads I have a boyfriend who is very similar... I understand that not wanting to confront him thing but how much smaller can you make yourself whilst simultaneously holding everyone and everything up?

The only thing I have found to cope and to keep myself is to emotionally detach from the arguments. Since I have done that I have been able to both be calmer and less upset by them and also i'be been able to see that every argument follows the same pattern - I am justifiably hurt by something BF does, I tell him I am hurt, he is angry, tells me I am overreacting, that I am crazy, that I am manipulative, that he is scared of how I just randomly explode about unreasonable things and that he knows they are unreasonable because reasonable people/his friends all agree with him...

Always the same no matter what has happened. We had a stonking argument on Friday and he stomped off knocking my lamp off my bedside table. Just having some distance from it emotionally, like quietly watching inside my head, it is stopping me from being as hurt and helping me to really focus on how out of order he is, that it isn't me (as he says). I'm not quite up to breaking up but I think it will happen at some point. I don't love him, I'm just scared of him and I know that now at least.

Then he should absolutely go to a doctor and get himself properly diagnosed and treated.

It's an excuse, OP. And at some level he knows it. He just wants to keep getting stoned.

If he thinks he has ADHD he should seek proper medical help for it. It isn't a reason to smoke weed and drinking is a lot more than a nice way to relax in the way he does it (in the park at lunch, all night prior to a colonoscopy, as soon as he gets home).

Yes, it's about dd really. I don't like her seeing him when he's angry like earlier in the weekend. She doesn't seem frightend but it doesn't look good to see one parent shouting at the other. He never usually loses it like that so its not a regular thing but still not good ever.

Oh, and is the skunk also for his "ADHD"?

Your daughter is already being aggressive towards other children. Guess why. It's not going to get better by itself as she grows older in this environment.

I told him to leave repeatedly after he whacked the lamp over but he wouldn't, just started crying about his friend who died recently but I have started seeing that as manipulative as he always does some kind of crying after he does the shouting/stomping.

Dd is not likely to be frightened if it is her normal environment. The problems you should look for is dd not being frightened/worried by situations that are frightening/worrying such as him opening a can/smoking a joint in the park in the middle of the day or stomping around.

Sorry offred that sounds rough. I haven't read your threads but I did read about your upbringing on someone else's and it sounds like you've been through it all

Oh god yes! Just want you to know you aren't the only fuck up! Ha ha!

He just likes skunk I think. It really zones him out.

Well I guess that should be 'woman in a relationship with a fuck up'

There's no point talking to him. He's an addict talking like an addict.

Are you sure he still has a job? If he's this dependent on drink and drugs it must affect his work. Mutterings about being better off on benefits and a "mistake" making his wages too low are big red flags.

I wonder if he got told to go home some time this week because he was in no state to work and his wages got docked accordingly, or maybe he was even sacked, or under threat of being sacked if he does it again.

It would explain the smaller pay packet and him "deciding" he might want to go on benefits.

It does sound a bit manipulative offred I mean how can you not sound cold hearted if that's the reason they give. I hope you get it sorted for the better whatever happens.

I'm friends with his manager rabbit and he used to call me saying that he was worried about my dh and that (as he put it) partying that hard wasn't helping his health condition so his work know somethings up.

I really don't think he'd jack it all in though.

Being detached helps you see the pattern. Also there was no logical reason for him to suddenly get upset about that right then. If he had really felt upset about that right then and was accurately conveying his feelings when he was shouting and stomping - he can't deal with how awful I am, then why would he want to be that vulnerable? Meh, he just wanted to have me comfort him about something and make all the bad stuff go away for him.

I really hope you get fed up of this at some point, OP. For your daughter's sake mainly, but also for yours. Doesn't sound like you are about to, though.

Just one thing: you (desperately) want him to change. He's certainly not going to change if things remain just the same. Why should he change? He's happy with the way things are.

He might not jack it in but they might sack him.

Sounds awfully like he is warming you up to him not having a job.

Can you call the manager and check if everything is OK?

There will be a pattern with your h too. Won't be the same one most likely but given that his premises are so unreasonable the responses to the arguments that hurt and destabilise you will be formulaic. Detach, find the pattern and it proves to yourself that it is not you.

Has he just got less because of being off for the colonoscopy?